ORDER gallin;e. 145 



The peacocks, like other gallinae, seize the grain with the 

 point of the bill, and swallow it without bruising it. In 

 drinking, they plunge the bill into the water, where they 

 make five or six quick movements with the lower jaw, and, 

 holding their head in a horizontal posture, they swallow the 

 water without any motion of the bill. It is said, that during 

 sleep they conceal their head under the wing, keeping the 

 bill to the wind. They ar3 birds of extreme cleanliness, and 

 endeavour to cover or bury their excrements. 



" Their brilliant plumes, which surpass in beauty the 

 fairest flowers, wither, like them, and fall with each succeed- 

 ing year. The peacock, then, as if sensible and ashamed of 

 his loss, fears to be seen in this humiliating state, and seeks 

 out the most gloomy retreats in which to conceal himself from 

 every eye, until returning Spring restores him to his accus- 

 tomed splendour, and brings him back upon the scene, to 

 receive the homage which his beauty inspires. It is pre- 

 tended, that, in reality, he enjoys admiration, and that the 

 true method to engage him to display his fine plumage, is to 

 bestow attention and praise upon him ; and that, on the con- 

 trary, when he is neglected, he folds up his treasures, and 

 withdraws them from the view of those who know not how to 

 appreciate them," — (Buffon.) 



This, perhaps, is carrying matters a little too far ; but we 

 do not see, for our own parts, why nature, who does nothing 

 in vain, should clothe any of her animated and sensitive 

 productions in such resplendent beauty, unless it was intended 

 as a source of enjoyment to themselves, or their kind. It is 

 rather too much to assert, that it was for the purpose of 

 pleasing the eye of man alone that she produced this 

 chef d'oeuvre of the feathered race. She has filled with 

 music, and with loveliness, the trackless forest, and the moun- 

 tain-wild, where his voice has been never heard, where his 

 footsteps have never penetrated. 



VOL. VIII. L 



